


Baptism in Brimstone

by Ihsan997



Category: Dungeons & Dragons (Roleplaying Game), Dungeons & Dragons - All Media Types, Forgotten Realms
Genre: Angel Corruption, Blasphemy, Blood, Blood and Gore, Blood and Injury, Blood and Violence, Deal with a Devil, Deception, Devils, Evil Wins, Fratricide, Gen, Human Sacrifice, Matricide, Minor Character Death, Original Character Death(s), Serious Injuries, Subterfuge, Swordfighting, Swords & Sorcery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-31
Updated: 2020-05-20
Packaged: 2020-10-04 02:54:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 10
Words: 15,447
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20463848
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ihsan997/pseuds/Ihsan997
Summary: This is the story of Normanir Chandler, heir of a modest household whose dark secrets finally caught up with them. Watch his descent and degeneration into evil as his infernal pact wreaks destruction upon the land.This is a story where the bad guys win. You have been warned.





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

> Forgotten Realms is the property of Wizards of the Coast and Hasbro.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Decades ago, a young man began his road to perdition with the help of a fallen angel.

Blood.

Up and down the walls, there was blood.

Down the finely carved steps of the spiral staircase, there was blood.

From one end of the ornate wine cellar to the other, there was blood.

Dripping from the stone grey ceiling to the profane runes on the floor, there was blood.

Stained on the eight corpses of his now departed family, there was blood.

Blood on the candlesticks they’d tricked him into dipping himself.

Blood on the rubble of the twisted idols he’d smashed.

Blood on the tattered raiment draped over the altar.

Blood on the plain brown robes he’d worn to conceal himself.

Blood on the gardening shovel he’d used to do it all.

Blood smeared on the hands which had rendered him the sole heir to their name.

Tears streamed down the young man’s cheeks as he knelt on the floor in front of the altar. For a very long time after he’d uttered the incantation, he heard nothing. Not a soul survived in the house save his sisters’ cats upstairs, leaving him to wonder if he’d wasted the effort. Truly, he had no idea what he was doing, but what other options did he have?

The odor of his family’s blood began to fill the room, though he was beyond the point of nausea. There was no coming back from what he’d done, and as he stared numbly at the bloody runes on the floor, and the subtle details which he’d altered based on the grimoire he’d discovered in a sealed-off room in the attic, he found himself unable to act. To move. To think.

Stunned into silence, he waited until the blood forming the runes began to bubble and churn. Motionless from bereavement and shock, he observed without interfering as the symbols he’d traced glows and took a more definite shape. A pentagram burned beneath the blood yet didn’t generate heat, and cool smoke wafted up as the red lifeblood boiled in place without spilling beyond the lines of the runic circle.

In a scene which would have frightened anyone else, a circle of fire opened up on the floor, providing a fleeting image of a scorched landscape. The disheveled young man didn’t react, however, not entirely feeling or grasping the gravity of the situation. Even when the otherworldly being rose up from the blood-fueled fire, he didn’t flee or even stand up. Kneeling on the floor with his hands limp at his sides, he did nothing more than breathe as he gazed upon the infernal spirit which floated up out of the circle.

Flame-touched wings folded behind her back, providing a relatively narrow profile for the elegant, almost angelic silhouette. Light from the flames revealed the battle-hardened albino face of a very different creature, though, and cold eyes contrasting with the heat of her wings stared down at him judgmentally. When she noticed that he was too numb to shrink away from her judgment, she became impatient.

After a few quick glances to the lifeless bodies scattered around the cellar, she folded her arms behind her back and frowned at the crestfallen figure deeply. “You dare to call on Zariel, Archdevil of Avernus, gateway to the Nine Hells?” the fiery fiend asked him rhetorically. “Explain yourself or face my wrath!”

Too dejected to properly and intelligently fear the horror he’d summoned, the young man remained kneeling before her, eyes downcast out of heartache rather than the necessary deference.

“My name is Normanir Chandler…son and heir of this house…heir of a calamitous name…and I beseech you by the blood of my own family.

“I want to make a deal.”


	2. Chapter Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An aspirant heretic and a fallen angel begin the actual process of negotiation.

Surrounded by fire and blood, the disheveled, broken young man knelt on the floor without fear, pulling his limp arms up to stretch out his hands to the haughty fallen angel hovering in the cellar. Her flaming eyes burned down on every inch of him with her judgment, but his total lack of fear gave her pause.

“You wish to make a deal, yet you have no idea if I’m interested in your offer,” Zariel said in her echoing cadence. “I, archdevil of the first layer, seek; I am not sought,” she added with a dismissive tone. The way she paused and waited for his response, however, made her verbal test as clear to him as the hellish image shimmering below her.

“Your power and hate have proven irresistible,” Normanir replied, feeling a bit of the pain over his actions recede now that he had his audience. “What am I to do but seek your favor? I have spilled so much blood, and I can think of no other patron for which I wish.”

Her fiery feathers ruffled visibly, betraying her strong reaction toward the precisely correct type of flattery. “Then you’ve earned yourself a few fleeting moments in which I won’t kill you for interrupting my spot inspection. Tell me about this,” she said, sweeping her hand across the eight corpses littering the room, causing him to bristle. Though her expression didn’t change, he could sense her revelry in the twinge of pain she’d caused him.

“This is…was…my family,” he replied evenly, controlling his breaths. Though he was still numb, he feared the weakness of sorrow, and he chose his words carefully. “My siblings…my grandparents…one uncle and one cousin…my…mother. All of them. As their heir, I offer you…I offer their souls to you in exchange for your time. I hope that the recent nature of their demise allows you to retrieve them before the forces of chaos can.”

Though still haughty, with her nose upturned, Zariel directed her disapproval toward the dead bodies scattered among the wine racks and broken bottles. “Your family bears Abyssal taint,” she sneered.

He nodded. “They do. They tried to call forth a demon of some sort. I realized what they were doing, and I slayed them in time.”

“Slayed?” she asked derisively. “Your family members look soft. You killed them with a gardening tool. I am not impressed.”

The way she paused after she’d verbally stabbed him in the heart again made her testing even more apparent. He needed that reminder, that sharp pain, for the pain of loss was great even when mixed with hatred. “I prevented them from helping the Abyss creep back into this plane. I did what I had to do, and what only I could do, because only I knew what was happening.”

“And so you have my attention without my wrath…for a time. Tell me, mortal: what is the meaning of this? Be direct, and don’t waste my time.”

“Hell forbid I waste that which you value,” he replied, though her reaction to the second round of flattery was more muted. “My family masqueraded at adherents to the Church of Ilmater. I was raised to uphold the law, and believe in the law, even if I could not accept their naïve devotion to the idea of goodness.”

“I asked what happened here, not for your personal backstory,” she said, more disappointed than agitated.

“Of course. I only wished to reveal to you their secret: my family, as I recently came to discover, were only using the church as a front. They were worshipping demons, and from what I can tell, this is not recent. I was always excluded from this part of their lives, for reasons I don’t understand.”

“So you killed your family out of resentment? That’s a mortal dispute. I’m not interested.”

“There is more, o archdevil of the first layer! This is what I wanted to say. I was raised to uphold the law, and I had no excessive issues beyond what we mortals face with family. Their secret devotion to chaos is what…” He paused before his voice hitched in his throat, weary of showing weakness in front of the fallen angel. “…forced me to eliminate them. I was motivated by a sincere desire to oppose the forces of chaos, to keep the Abyss far down below the lowest of planes where it belongs. This was not a tale of revenge.”

“Then your evil deed for the day is complete. Congratulations.” Zariel dramatically unfolded her arms from behind her back and refolded them in front of her chest. “I’m still not impressed.”

Her words vexed him, but she neither took her leave nor continued speaking, granting him a sliver of hope that she was merely pushing him to reach his main point. “I wouldn’t expect one of your lofty status to be; that’s not the reason why I called on you,” he said. She stared at him, granting him time to explain himself. “I’ve come to realize that the corruption of the Abyss cannot be stopped…it’s constant, unending, and must be opposed at all times. If even my family, as lawfully strict as they were, could fall, then there’s limit to who can be corrupted on this plane. Demonic influence must be stamped out everywhere.”

“By you?” Zariel asked rhetorically. “You think that I’m interested in hearing from you because you ambushed a few cultists with a shovel?”

On instinct, Normanir balled up his fists and bristled. A measure of fear finally worked its way into his mind, much belated considering his interlocutor, but the sensation proved to be unfounded. Instead of reacting in anger, though, Zariel raised an eyebrow at him curiously. His fear decreased.

“A few cultists-“ He cut off his own sentence and adjusted his tone for the person he was addressing. “Lady of the First, I spilled the blood of my own mother to oppose the forces of the Abyss!” he said pointedly. “The blood spilled on this floor is the same as the blood flowing in my veins. I’ll go to any end in this multiverse to serve the cause of lawful evil. This is not merely bashing a few cultists with a shovel.”

Although she kept her arms folded in front of her, they didn’t pull as tightly as before. Even when he’d spoken out of turn to her, she seemed more intrigued than irritated. Her gazed washed over the corpses of the deceased Chandler household before returning to the bloodline’s final member. “You don’t look like them,” she said earnestly and without mockery. “I smell fey ancestry in your blood, but not in theirs.”

“My father was a drifter from the woods, but he’s no more an object of attachment for me than these betrayers you see here,” Normanir replied acrimoniously.

“A wood elf, then. Can you swing a sword?”

Numbness receding, Normanir found himself less tense once the fallen angel had begun to interact with him more professionally. “It’s the only thing the lout taught me before he left. Marching and fighting is armor was taught to me by my uncle.” He pointed toward one of the corpses, all of them full-blooded humans. “If I have more than a shovel, then I will add the bodies of many more demon-worshipers to that pile. You will find me a useful tool in the Blood War.”

Her feathers ruffled again in reaction to his promise. Haughtiness was replaced by a more sober-eyed judgment, and Zariel bore a sort of regal air about her as she regarded the apparent half-elf kneeling to her. “Then you’ve bought yourself a few moments beyond a mere conversation, mortal. What would you ask of the ruler of Avernus?”

Normanir‘s heart pounded in his chest, excited and stressed by the gradually approaching success. Originally, he hadn’t even expected the summoning circle to work; he could have easily ended up as a broken, destitute man wasting away in a house full of his own family’s corpses. Now, he gulped and worked hard to control his breathing, feeling success so nearly in his grasp.

“I wish to pledge my soul to the Nine Hells and to yield direction of my fury to you,” he said while bowing his head solemnly. To his confusion, she didn’t seem to understand his simple request.

“Indeed, a pact with the Nine Hells will require this of you at a minimum, though the sacrifice of your own family is a rare and desirable act. But what do you ask of the Lady of the First?” Zariel asked.

“I…wish to pledge my soul to the Nine Hells and to submit to the ruler of Avernus.”

Zariel did a double take. “Yes, but..you…Normanir Chandler, what do you ask of the ruler of Avernus?” she asked in frustration.

“I ask that you accept the sale of my soul and my oath of fealty to you!” he replied, just as frustrated.

“I know that…you…I…argh! Mortal, what do you want in return for your soul!”

“I want to give you my soul, that’s the point I’m trying to make, Lady Zariel!”

He finally looked up at her, matching her perplexed expression of annoyance. The two of them stared at each other for a few seconds before she stopped furrowing her brow so heavily. Ideas churned in her mind, but what they were, he could not tell.

“Just one minute,” she said before sinking back down into the portal to hell, dashing the young man’s previous hopes for swift success.


	3. Chapter Three

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Normanir’s offer catches the devils so off-guard that they don’t believe him at first. The trickiest question is sometimes a plainly easy one.

As Zariel dipped back down through the portal in the floor, Normanir began to quiver. Technically, he hadn’t lost anything he’d already had before contacting the angel-turned-devil, but the way he lost sight of her filled him with a sense of loss. His shoulders slumped, and he didn’t even bother rising from his kneeling position.

The strangest error occurred with the portal, however. Instead of reverting to a typical summoning circle on the floor of his cellar, the gaping hole into Avernus remained, though the image flickered and blurred; the various hues of red and orange dulled and blended, warping the view he had of the first layer of Hell. Although Zariel dropped out of his view, leaving only the searing mountains and burning skies to look at, he heard the sound of her landing on a surface he couldn’t see.

“Bel!” Zariel yelled, though in which direction, Normanir didn’t know. “Bel, get over here! You need to listen to this.”

Wings flapped as another creature, seemingly the fallen angel’s lieutenant, approached. The smallest flock of a wingtip moved across the visible part of the portal, but otherwise, Normanir couldn’t see the scene unfold.

“Yes, archdevil?” came the gravely voice of the pit fiend, oddly cordial considering the sordid history between the two.

“Bel, assess this scenario. Some mortals contacted me, some elf or something like it.”

“A half-elf, my lady, though I can assure you that my partial fey ancestry-“

Zariel continued speaking, causing Normanir to fall silent. “He sacrificed his family to contact me, but instead of asking for a pact, he wants me to take his soul.”

“In exchange for what, archdevil?” Bel asked nonchalantly.

“For nothing; he literally just wants me to take his soul. That’s what he’s asking for.”

“If I may, archdevil,” Normanir tried to interject, “I hadn’t finished explaining my motivations.”

His protests fell on deaf ears, and he felt a little invisible as the pair continued talking about him right in front of him. “It’s a trick,” Bel replied brusquely. “But whatever for? Did he say what he wanted?”

“No, he just kept talking about how much he hates his family. But he already killed them by himself, so I don’t know what he actually wants from me.”

“Are they truly dead? It may be an ambush.”

“If you could give me a moment,” Normanir tried again, but he felt like they weren’t even listening.

“Not possible; I sense the evil in him, of the lawful variety. His family were demon worshippers, and he got mad,” Zariel said.

Bel hummed while considering the situation. “Sounds like a revenge story.”

“Yes, but it’s complete. What could he want? I’ve considered every possible tactic, but none of them make logical sense.”

“Is he still waiting for you?” Bel asked.

What Zariel said next clarified much of what Normanir had been perplexed by. “Yes, he’s on the other side of the portal, but it’s liminal barrier is sealed. He can’t hear us.”

Normanir’s eyes opened wide. “O lady of the first, I can actually hear you,” he said in a raised voice, but to no avail. The planar connection had been faulty, and he was left listening in on a conversation he wasn’t meant to hear.

“Perhaps we can open a communication gate to Meritos,” Bel suggested.

“Agreed, his knowledge of strategy is sound; perhaps he’ll have an idea of what this mortal is up to,” Zariel replied.

Magic crackled out of Normanir’s view, warping the portal on his cellar floor to the point where all of the colors changed. The burning steppes of Avernus were replaced with a barren glacier in Stygia, though the image was still dulled and blurred. All that was visible was ice and the shoulder and arm of an ice devil. On one side.

“Archdevil of the First, I need your call,” came the insectoid voice of the ice devil.

“Meritos, we need your help to settle a discussion,” Zariel said without any pleasantries. “Some mortal sacrificed his family and contacted me offering his soul.”

“He wants his family back?” Meritos the ice devil replied.

“That’s the thing, he doesn’t. I have no idea what he wants,” Zariel replied.

“Come on…I can tell you in thirty seconds,” Normanir grumbled in vain.

“A masochist. His soul is wracked with guilt, and he wishes for its punishment,” Meritos suggested. The ice devil’s arm shifted in the portal’s image, making a gesture Normanir couldn’t see.

“That’s the thing, he really doesn’t,” Zariel replied again. “He hates his family. They were demon worshippers, and he claims he wants to fight in the Blood War.”

“He wants to sell his soul, and the price is to fight in the Blood War?” Meritos asked rhetorically. “Impossible. I scoff. It’s a poorly considered trick.”

“That’s what I was thinking,” Bel chimed in. “But from what Zariel describes, the mortal appears sincere.”

For a moment, the ice devil paused in thought. Its insectoid hand moved across the portal image so it could scratch its head. “If he wishes for a Pact, then it will ultimately be with Asmodeus.”

“You’re really suggesting we bother the Lord of the Ninth for this?” Bel asked, though Normanir’s heart beamed with hope.

“Yes,” was all Meritos said.

“Agreed; this is the quickest solution. This mortal is either extremely crafty or mentally disturbed. I’ll reroute our portal of contact to Nessus.” Zariel casted a crackling spell, and the image of glaciers fizzled out, leaving in its wake a shimmering, wavy image of an upside-down shelf affixed to a wall of crimson stone. “Lord of the Ninth, have you heard?” Zariel asked the unseen figure.

When the person spoke, Normanir’s skin broke out into goosebumps, and his shoulders twitched nervously. “I heard,” the deep, noble-sounding voice replied and then proceeded in an almost therapeutic tone, “and I saw. I felt him as clearly as I feel any being with a truly evil soul. He’s neither lying nor a fool.”

Normanir’s heart fluttered and skipped two beats, once at the complement from the master of Hell himself, and a second time at the way the naysaying of the two doubting devils were caught off guard. Zariel fell silent, and Bel stammered.

“He…then…he’s selling his soul as the benefit rather than the cost?” the pit fiend wondered aloud. “But what value does a soul have if it’s gained at such a low price?”

“The soul isn’t the aspect of a loyal soldier which holds its value,” Asmodeus replied, soothing Normanir’s nerves every time he spoke. “The value lies in the services rendered. For a true believer such as this, you must view his mortal husk as temporary, his status equal to the remainder of our legions’ rank and file. This isn’t a shortsighted mortal offering his soul as currency for temporal power; this is a strategist who believes in our mission.”

Bel made a noise as if to protest but wisely held his tongue, allowing Zariel to demurely accept correction of her viewpoint. “How shall I arrange his contract, considering the nature of his offer?” she asked Asmodeus, masking her skepticism well.

“Give the mortal a gift and a quest.”

There was a moment of uncomfortable silence until Bel cleared his throat. “My lord, our rank and file in the Blood War must survive numerous conflicts before receiving commendations,” the pit fiend said in a mousy voice which didn’t match the image Normanir had in his head of such a fearsome creature. When Bel began to murmur, that image was shattered even further. “I…well…of course, I only mention this to measure project development.”

“Shall I bestow upon the mortal anything in particular?” Zariel interjected before Bel could further embarrass himself.

“I can sense his presence through the portal he opened, as I can sense any evil soul…he’s a fighter, but without a path in life other than his hatred. Grant him a weapon befitting his quest…and always show mortals so willing to pledge themselves that the Nine Hells are generous to those who wield power successfully.” After a brief pause which may or may not have been punctuated by gestures or expressions, the Lord of the Ninth spoke again. “The pact which you must settle with him is separate, and must be tied to his quest. Send him out to spread disbelief…the weapon you’ll give him is his to use, but failure in his quest will constitute violation of the pact. You know what must be done in such cases.”

“All you’ve expressed will be carried out, Lord of the Ninth,” Zariel replied before Bel could. The pit fiend remained silent, likely in recognition of the fallen angel’s authority over him.

“I know it will. And, by the way…in the future, you - all of you, including Meritos - may want to check the containment of portals used for communication,” Asmodeus said for the last time.

Despite the prime archdevil’s soothing tone, Normanir felt his hair follicles stand on end at the final command. There was a long pause during which Normanir felt as if he were being watched, hearing no sound and seeing only the flipped image of the shelf against a wall. Too amazed by the resounding success of his very first attempt at contacting another plane to feel shocked, he merely wondered what sort of commotion had been caused once Asmodeus had noticed the fact that their entire conversation had been heard.

A partial glimpse of that commotion was visible on Zariel’s face when she appeared a few minutes later. Rising up out of the portal once it had switched back to Avernus, she glared at Normanir with tightly pursed lips, like a sack of wheat ready to burst. She demonstrated incredible self-control when she spoke with restraint, but the tightness in her jaw clashed too obviously with her even tone of voice.

“Fetch me a chair, mortal,” she ordered, “so I can get this part over with.”


	4. Chapter Four

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Once they get down to the nitty gritty, the devils find that this particular mortal isn’t looking for a quick and easy, open-ended contract of soul sale.

Four hours later, when the corpses had already begun to fill the cellar with their odious odor, the two of them leaned back and quietly read the copies of the contract drawn up by the mini-devils attending the archdevil. Normanir couldn’t help but glance at the miserable creatures occasionally: small-sized, red-skinned, and hunched, like an ugly little cross between tieflings and halflings but with the positive traits of neither. They certainly wrote fast, though, which was a relief. Even Zariel, despite her immortal alertness, was growing weary of the discussion.

“You’re far too frustrating to deal with for a mortal negotiating such an insignificant pact,” she announced while thumbing through the fine print of the contract. He was mirroring her movements, poring over the fine print as well.

“Thank you,” he replied, causing her to bristle at the third or fourth time he’d responded to her insults with thanks.

“This has taken my attention away from the front lines for more time than it’s ultimately worth,” she added.

He wasn’t quite sure if she even cared if he heard her or not, so he tested her with an actual cogent response. “I believe you’ll change your mind when you see what I can contribute to the war effort.”

She sneered mockingly, but her sneer almost looked like a smile, which was the most positive reaction he’d received from her. After a few more minutes free of insults, she set her copy down on the table he’d brought in from the dining room upstairs. “Did you read the fine print?” she asked tersely.

“Only every time you asked me,” he replied, sincerely not intending to sound passive aggressive, but she glared at him all the same. “I take your instructions seriously.”

She folded her hands in front of her, though one of them appeared to be a weaponized prosthetic. “To review: you sacrificed your family’s souls to me, giving Avernus priority to them over the Fugue Plane. This is your right as sole heir of your family. In return, I won’t kill you for interrupting my troop inspection for the past few hours.”

“Of course. I’m honored by your audience.”

Ignoring his complement this time, she continued reading off the main points of the agreement. “You’ll be given a weapon commensurate with the tasks you’re offering to do as a signing bonus. The weapon is yours, but it’s jealous and demands that you use it when slaying your foes. The souls of anyone who falls by it are mine.”

Normanir was about to ask for the purpose of such a clause since he didn’t need souls himself, but he stopped himself when he realized that letting her have as many victories as he could bear in the negotiation was in his interest. “As they should be, Lady of the First,” he said, peeling away a small portion of her irate sneer with his words. She didn’t react to his comment otherwise, but she did continue without mocking him further.

“Next, your pact. For reasons I can’t comprehend, you insist on having a staff, so instead of a standard tome or chain, you’ll take these Hellions as your servants,” she said while nodding toward the two mini-devils, both of whom grinned stupidly when they were mentioned. “You’re also entitled to a flock of familiars - as needed only - and a talisman for one abishai.”

“We hadn’t discussed which species I’d have as a minion,” Normanir said, vigorously searching through the fine print. “Wait, it’s already here.”

“Yes, and that’s not a detail I felt I needed to check before adding. You asked for a minion you could command occasionally for whatever wasteful reason you’ve thought of; is this really cause to start renegotiating?”

“I didn’t intend that, my lady.” He spent a few moments reading the fine print, which required him to squint and hold that portion of the scroll close to his eyes. “It seems you already have a specific devil in mind. Why an abishai?”

“For you? Because it’s what you asked for. For it? As a punishment for a previous failure. Also, to spite Tiamat.”

Upon hearing the justification, Normanir set the contract down and wondered which part he should ask about first. “Could I be implicated in committing a slight against Tiamat?” he asked. This time when Zariel’s expression hardened, she didn’t seem to be directing her ire at him.

“One-hundred percent no,” she said emphatically. “Neither you, nor I, nor the devil in question can be implicated in anything. Tiamat answers to Asmodeus but at a lower rank than I, and her lair is under my auspices.”

“And…this talisman you’ll give me is part of a punishment for the devil in question?” he asked with a cautious hesitation.

Her upper lip stiffened. “That’s none of your concern,” she said, a tone of finality in her netherworldly voice. “Moving on, your ability to summon the aforementioned creatures is the only form of magic you’ll be granted for now. These are for the purposes of countering Abyssal or other meddlesome influence on the prime material plane only; they are not your personal property, and aren’t to be used for personal errands.”

“Except for when such errands can maintain my anonymity,” he interjected. Her lip curled at his comment, but he knew contract law from his family business well enough to know when he was justified. “My efforts depend on our enemies not knowing that I have a home base with a shrine in it; I’m free to use them for domestic chores, as you implied earlier when you mentioned a staff. Since I can no longer employ a staff of mortals without arousing suspicion among my neighbors, given my family’s deserved demise…”

His voice trailed off, leaving her to finish his thought. She didn’t like being corrected - not one bit - but she didn’t argue the point further. “The abishai‘s punishment is none of your concern,” she repeated. “By the way, the shrine isn’t until further down the list. Please stay focused. Your ability to summon these minions, for specific purposes, is the only magic you’ll be granted for now. Those minions are a symbol of the pact, and that pact is contingent upon your completion of your quest. Only upon successful completion will you have an open-ended promise of proper pact magic siphoned from a grant by Tiamat, expanding based on your annual performance rating.”

Having spent a good hour just sorting out the performance rating, Normanir wasn’t in the mood for revisiting the topic. “Alright, so the shrine?” he asked, skipping to another point.

“Why do you need to ask about this? Establish it here in your cellar, see that it’s maintained.”

“Unless, unless, unless I travel beyond the Sword Coast for a single quarter against my own will,” he said, emphasizing a point she’d previously resisted rather strongly by wagging his finger.

Had he not let Zariel feel like she was winning by claiming the souls of all his victims, his poignant emphasis might have provoked her, but she permitted his behavior as a victory she felt she’d granted to placate him. “Yes, you made that clear; watch your tone,” she warned, and he bowed his head deferentially.

“My apologies.”

Once she’d stared at him long enough to feel he’d been reminded of her dominance, she leaned back again. “So the shrine must be established here as a part of your initiation into my ranks, with further shrines beyond the Sword Coast contributing to your performance rating. The scale of punishments and rewards for the performance rating are separated between your pact and your weapon; do we need to review the scale again?"

"Let's not, please," he replied, admitting defeat to appease her even when he knew she didn't want to revisit such a convoluted topic again either. "The only major point remaining is the quest to seal the pact."

Zariel tried to wave the topic away with her prosthetic claw-hand. "That should be the clearest part of the contract."

"Clear in the sense that it includes the fewest lines of fine print; unclear in the sense that there aren't enough details mentioned."

Her fiery eyes widened at his comment, though she seemed more exasperated than upset. Sitting up straight, she spoke to him without her usual commanding, borderline condescending tone. "What more could you want, mortal! Most of your kind who strike up deals with the Nine Hells want to conclude their bargains in a matter of minutes. The sun is starting to rise here in your miserable plane, and you’re still nitpicking over a lack of details!”

“Because I don’t want to screw myself over in the future.”

“Then don’t screw up! Look, look at this,” she said while tapping on his own copy of the contract. “You must sunder a shrine of Torm and drive its laypeople to disbelief within a year from today. You're lucky I don’t make you kiss my feet for giving you such an easy quest in return for all you’re reaping from this deal!”

“How am I to locate such a shrine? How many laypeople must their be? What type of sundering-“

She cut a line through the air with her natural hand, cowing him into silence. “Another word and I’ll start adding fine print. Understood?” He nodded without speaking, wary of pushing his luck on a deal which was already tilted in his favor. “Good. You have your mission, and you’ve stolen four hours of my time just to get this far. Congratulations: you’re already my least favorite soldier.”

“But if I serve you for my lifetime, I have a chance to…?” he asked, letting his voice trail off innocently as he pushed the last point.”

For a split second, he felt terror creep up on him as she looked at the contract in her hands and frowned at it deeply. A fleeting, momentary fear that she’d back out upon reviewing how much he’d earned stung him, and his foot began tapping nervously under the table. When she opened her mouth to speak, his heart clenched almost long enough for him to pass out. In the end, though, his paranoia was just barely proven unjustified.

With a simple pinprick, she drew a bit of her own fiery blood and signed her copy and his. “…you enter Hell as a minimum rank four devil in Avernus,” she sighed as she burned her signature onto the infernal contracts. He rushed to sign both copies with his own blood as well, lest she pull it away at the last moment. She watched him with resignation in her eyes. “If you fail, you’ll wallow with the lemures for your first millennium after death,” she warned.

“A fair wager,” he replied, too ecstatic to focus on anything else.


	5. Chapter Five

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is a sort of second arc here - a combination of slice of life as well as plodding plot building towards full motivation establishment.
> 
> Also, ugly little devils who dance badly.

Normanir didn’t even wait until the following sunrise before he got to work. Under normal circumstances, he might have spent a fair amount of time mourning his family. Even though he felt they deserved their end, there may have been a period during which he lamented over what could have been or how their lives might have turned out differently. Not now, though; he had a job to do.

Still in the wrecked wine cellar, he waited as the two ugly little servants he’d been granted finished the job of extracting what little blood was left from the stiff, decaying bodies of his family. A brief, fleeting sense of filial jealousy filled him as he watched the mini-devils slicing pieces out of the corpses, but he repressed those feelings quickly once one of the homely twerps held up a bowl of the putrid red liquid to him.

“We collected their blood, master!” the little devil called a Hellion said. “Did we do good?”

Displaying no emotion, he only glanced at the bowl briefly. “It’s sufficient. Now, take a look at this.” He pulled out the talisman Zariel had given him yesterday. “Can you draw the sigil engraved on this?”

The stupidly grinning mongrel climbed on a wine rack like a monkey to get a better look at the obsidian artifact. “I know that symbol. We can draw it…if we have…” The creature glanced around, looking at the shattered bottles and splintered wood everywhere. “…pencils?”

Normanir’s face must have hardened, because he noticed the Hellion shrink away. “Use the blood you just collected,” he said in an even tone, trying to emulate Zariel’s decorum even when upset.

The mini-devil’s hairless eyebrows shot up. “Oh…right! The blood bowl!” She turned around toward the other Hellion, which appeared to be her fraternal twin brother. Or a clone. Or they all just looked very similar. “We need the blood to draw calling circles!”

The other hunched over creature stopped sucking blood from its fingers and collected its bowl. “Blood circles!” he bleated in a raspy little voice.

“Sooner rather than later,” Normanir said while running his thumb over the talisman impatiently.

Both of his small servants met in the middle of the aisles of wine racks, nervously rushing through the profane sigil. They apparently made a few errors and had to backtrack, wiping lines of blood away and redesigning them. After what felt like ten minutes, they finished the intricate lines and stood up straight, a seemingly uncomfortable and unnatural position for their curve, almost gnoll-like spines.

“Presto!” they both chirped in screechy, tone deaf unison.

“Good job,” Normanir said while waving the two of them away. They both rubbed their hands together, snickering with glee at the complement because normal laughter was apparently impossible for them. “Now…I studied a few basic courses in spellcraft, but I never even reached the level of cantrips. Let’s see if this works.”

In a low voice, Normanir began chanting words he hadn’t even learned. Their presence felt intrusive within his brain, unnatural and unlearned, and the verbal components felt like another person was using his tongue even though he’d studied the grammar and syntax of Infernal. Yet flow the words did, spilling from his mouth for the first time ever, yet sounding so fluent that anyone else would have assumed he’d repeated them all his life. His vision blurred as the blood forming the sigil glowed brightly, pulsating with each syllable. By the time he’d finished the incantation, he needed to lean against a wine rack for a moment.

Hellfire crackled on the floor, granting him another glimpse of Avernus. Slowly, a shadowy hand reached up through the floor, gripping the stone blocks for stability as another one followed. Two wingtips finagled their way through, and soon enough, a gangly gargoyle-like being crawled into the Prime Material Plane. Once it had entered, the portal to Avernus closed behind it, leaving a few plumes of smoke rising up off the floor, now stained with dried blood. A black Abishai stood in the middle of the cellar, eying its caller warily like an abused dog evaluating a potential adopter. Due to its semi-bipedal posture, it appeared slightly shorter than its summoner despite having larger dimensions overall. It looked horrific, like a perfect enforcer.

The two of them sized each other up for a few seconds before the scaly devil raised its arms in a questioning shrug. “Well?” it asked in Infernal.

Normanir needed a few more seconds to mentally switch languages, especially for one he was used to reading rather than speaking. “Welcome to your new home…for now. You’re speaking to Normanir Chandler, and we’ll be working together for the duration of my mortality.”

Hesitantly, the black scaly devil tested him with insults. “We’ll see how long that lasts,” It quipped, though it was shut down swiftly.

“If it ends early, your punishment will be more severe than mine, Karakul-Phy’lok,” Normanir said, using its true name and causing it to back away from him. “I’ll call you by your preferred, known name, and you maintain respect for me in public at all times. How’s that for a simple deal?”

Cowed from its very first minute on the prime world, the black scaly devil’s wings hugged tightly to its back sheepishly. “My name is Shax,” it said flatly, trying yet failing to put up a confident front.

Seeing no reason to humiliate a minion, Normanir switched his tone at the deferent reaction. “Shax, you’re going to enjoy your time here. We have much evil to spread in my world. Your name will be known positively in the First Layer when all is said and done. Are you prepared to bring the Blood War to Toril?”

When faced with a closed-ended question, Shax had little to say other than affirmation. “Demonic invasions of Avernus have been very…inconvenient. They must be confined to the Abyss.”

“Good. Good, I’m glad to hear that you have experience with them. First, though, we have one year to sunder a temple to Torm.”

The two little Hellions began a laughably bad dance routine to celebrate the news, but Shax turned its head sideways in confusion. “What does the Triad have to do with the Abyss?” it asked.

Normanir waved the concern away without really listening. “Zariel wants that as an initiation rite. Don’t worry, we’ll get to the good stuff once the year is through. I trust that isn’t a particularly long period of time for you. Now.” He folded his arms behind his back much as she had, walking along the aisles of damaged wine racks and ignoring his minion’s attempt to interject. “The first order of business is corpse cleanup. You all need to drain the bodies of as much blood as possible for the sullying ritual. You’ll need all of the wood, glass, and other debris to build a makeshift shrine to Asmodeus here in the cellar. Strip the bodies, too - the cloth, leather, and other items can be used for now. You know more about infernal shrines than I do, so be creative with these two things.”

One of the Hellions raised a hand. “Actually, we have names.”

“Not until you finish this initial task, you don’t,” Normanir said. “Help Shax do everything I just explained. When it’s all finished, I need you to eat the corpses, too. There’s no other safe way to dispose of them.”

“This is all going to take way longer than the usual deal for an infernal calling,” Shax said, arms folded.

One last time, Normanir turned back to face the handful of devils sharing his house. “You were called with a ritual using the blood of my own family, along with your talisman, using your true name. You’re going to be here much longer than you’d expected…make yourself comfortable.” He began ascending the steps leading out of the cellar, much to the dismay of the black scaly devil with two small red mongrels dancing in circles around it.

“And just what do you plan on doing when we’re doing all the real work?” Shax asked up the stairs.

Without even looking at them, Normanir folded his hands behind his back and continued walking. “Securing my family estates, maintaining professional contacts…and researching every shrine along the Sword Coast.” He opened the door at the top of the stairs, heading toward the study which now belonged to him. “A year isn’t a lot of time.”


	6. Chapter Six

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Soon.

The trip to Waterdeep took a whole week due to caravan stops. Normanir could have covered the distance in less time had he ridden in a smaller group, but small groups could draw attention. When he arrived at the city’s trades ward anonymously, though, mixed into a crowd of merchants and migrants, he knew he’d made the right decision.

Not that he was likely to draw attention anyway. Now being the sole heir of a family in a less significant city, he was unlikely to be properly identified. Being a member of the guild of chandlery due only to his family connections, he was unlikely to have been previously known. Being a candlemaker with the tragically stereotypical surname of ‘Chandler’, he was unlikely to be distinguished from any other younger member of the guild. Being a member of a smaller guild without sleeping quarters, he was unlikely to even be identified at the cheap inn where he’d rented a room.

But he still felt paranoid. So much so that, after paying the annual dues required of all guild members, he waited for half a day before returning to the chandlery hall so the daytime clerk would be a different underpaid apprentice.

As small as the guild was, the space of the narrow, three story building was utilized well. Being the only such guild for makers of soap, wax, and lighting fixtures in the entire Sword Coast, the hall had been dedicated to records of vendors, trainers, producers, and customers for the entire region. Instead of grand reception areas and rooms for socializing, the guild served solely as a locus for networking and record keeping for members of their profession. That economic use of space, and that meticulous form of record keeping, proved to be a Pact boon in and of itself.

For hours, Normanir sifted through the guild’s records, delving into a trove of information on the region which hadn’t likely been opened in years. From the afternoon until twilight, he deftly avoided the handful of other visitors to the guild by strategically shifting his position among the shelves of the guild archive, never being seen until the bored clerk had already fallen asleep at her countertop in the cramped foyer. Undisturbed, he flipped through the stacks.

Those stacks…there were receipts of major sales shared with the guild, copies of letters of request, training records for journeymen from the previous century, and much, much more. He didn’t even decipher the labeling methodology for past customers of guild members until over an hour into his search, and it took him another hour to decode the symbols used for customers who were exempt from local taxes due to religious affiliations. Working without food, water, or even coffee, he plumbed the depths of the archive, poring over logs of what must have been every scented candle ever sold to a monetary in western and northwestern Faerun during the previous decade. The slower his progress was toward his goal, the more motivated he became, even growing stubborn as the unknown target he was looking for evaded him.

As if the Lord of the Ninth himself had sent an infernal miracle, Normanir finally located the perfect candidate only minutes before the clerk woke up and told him to leave so she could lock up. On a shelf where the record books were double-packed into two layers, with another layer of loose books laying on top horizontally, stuck between two hard cover volumes due to a stain from a sugary drink however long ago, wedged in with other loose pages torn out of logs, and all of the above improperly shelved and categorized…he found it.

Carefully, he looked over the single sheet of paper he’d found by means he couldn’t logically explain. To the northeast, deep in the High Forest but far from the settlements of elf or man, there was a single entry along with a crudely drawn map. On a hilly glade but away from proper roads, appearing more like a retreat than a proper house of worship, laid the Pertinent Promise shrine to Torm - a relatively new celestial shrine which had purchased a single order of scented candles seven years prior and then never put through any more requests which the guild had recorded, according to the anonymously written entry.

A lone shrine to Torm in the middle of nowhere, with no contact for years…Normanir wondered if Zariel had given him the order at random, or if she’d intended him to figure it out that way. All the same, he stole the record from the archive rather than copying it lest his target ever be noticed again. Not that anyone was likely to delve that deeply into the shelves anytime soon, but still…he had to be sure he couldn’t be traced. With his family eliminated, he had no backup plan were he ever to be outed for what he was planning to do.

He glanced at the calendar on the wall in the foyer as he was shooed out by the clerk. He’d already lost five weeks since his contract had been signed due to demands of the family business as well as his minions’ lack of creativity when helping him brainstorm. Even with forty seven weeks left, he felt the pressure begin.

“Soon,” he whispered to the stolen map in his pocket rhetorically.


	7. Chapter Seven

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The real plan to do great evil in the world begins.

By his fourth month into the year, Normanir could feel every day ticking by. The remainder of his time to fulfill his end of the bargain felt painfully short, and he found himself constantly counting the minutes passing by at random. Out in the southern edge of the High Forest, though, he had reason to count.

Tucked into a little camp he’d dug into the underbrush a day’s travel north of Loudwater, he continuously glanced over the canopy covering the rolling hills through a looking glass and then back at the hourglass he’d brought. Obsessive to an almost comical degree, he even logged his observations in a notebook he kept, noting any sounds he heard despite not having encountered any other people in the woods so far. Only in the early evening did his darkvision pick up movement ahead, and he checked in the looking glass to confirm that what he was seeing was correct.

For the next ten minutes, he waited for the flock of docile imps to return. Venomless but extra sneaky, the tiny creatures took their time darting in and out of the branches, as paranoid about being caught as he was. They eventually landed and hid in the bushes with him, bobbing with excitement and nervousness. He scooted closer to them, sitting cross legged and leaning down.

“Tell me,” he ordered, though his blunt manner with them caused no offense to the enthused little devils.

The first of the imps raised its hand, crawling forward beyond the others to practically sit in his lap. “Nobody saw us; they suspected nothing, and we scouted the entire area,” it said.

Normanir hummed in excitement and thrust his notebook into the hands of another imp. “Draw diagrams of everything you saw,” he ordered, and the devil began furiously scribbling down. “Fill every page with minute details if you can.”

“Yes sir!”

“Tell me, now: what did you see? Spare the details unless asked for now,” he ordered the first imp.

The tiny fiend rubbed its palms together. “It’s not a proper monastery; it’s smaller than your house, like a retreat. They don’t seem to be equipped for a large number of visitors.”

“How many people did you see there?”

“Seventeen,” said the first imp.

“Eighteen,” said the third imp.

“Sixteen,” said the fourth imp.

“Eighteen,” said the second imp, who was still drawing pictures of the place.

“Seventeen,” said the fifth imp.

“Sixteen,” said the sixth imp.

When Normanir frowned at them, the entire flock of the tiny devils shrank in fear. He pointed at three of them. “You all, take my second notebook and identify each individual person you can remember distinctly. Write down any discrepancies.” This time when he thrust a notebook at tiny fiends, none of them were brave enough to respond out loud. While they began to quietly bicker over what to write, Normanir looked to the pair who weren’t preoccupied. “Was anybody armed?”

The two imps tried to speak at the same time before glancing at each other hesitantly. The one who’d spoken first then continued. “Two young people carried maces, but they looked very new. Clerics in training, maybe?”

The second imp nodded and crawled closer. “There was also a suit of armor in the living quarters, but we couldn’t tell who it was for. There may be a professional paladin living there.”

“No one else?” Normanir asked, and both imps shook their heads.

“Only civilians,” the first imp said.

The second imp nodded and raised its hand. “One priest, a few nuns, and worshippers. Mostly young, but definitely staying for an extended period of time. The living quarters looked like a communal home, not a hostel.”

“And the shrine?” Normanir asked. “Was there a proper shrine to Torm?”

“Complete with a statue and all,” said the first imp.

Smiling deeply, Normanir rested his chin on his hand. With the rest of the flock dutifully scribbling away, the pair sitting at his knees waited curiously. Eventually, their master reached a conclusion.

“I’ll vouch for you to Zariel that you’ve begun a cycle of great evil today,” he said to the delight of the entire flock. “Soon, they will understand that the only law worth following is that of the Nine Hells.”


	8. Chapter Eight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He’s back! And he’s running out of time...

In the cramped, book-laden study of his villa outside Daggerford, Normanir turned away from the pages spread over his desk and rubbed his eyes. The hour was late, though his changing habits had caused him to lose his grip on time. Due to his half-elven blood, he slept very little, but even that brief period had been disrupted as the weeks dragged on. Work was still a necessary toil in order to support himself independently of others, and independence was necessary in order to keep distance from his community, thus adding to the various distractions from the clock ticking over his mind every day.

One of the two diminutive devil-servants brought him a fresh cup of tea, which he gladly took and sipped while standing by the shuttered window overlooking his garden. His obsessive planning had proven costly in terms of time, yet every time he felt ready to strike, he discovered new potential avenues for failure or exposure which he had to rethink. After more than a month since his return home, though, even the diabolical staff under his roof began to worry.

The deceptively light footsteps of Shax approached his office, given away by the awkward gait in the narrow hallway. The gargoyle-like scaly devil squeezed itself into the study, though a few bookshelves and an archival cabinet prevented it from joining Normanir at the window. Instead, the scaly devil just pored over the papers spread over the desk and examined the various diagrams and action plans for the desecration of the Pertinent Promise shrine. It snorted derisively while stroking its pointy chin with a talon, though Norm ignored the restless devil’s cry for attention.

“There isn’t much time left,” Shax said after a few moments of being ignored. “This has taken far too long.”

As annoying as the idle, unoccupied devil was, Normanir knew that the comment was accurate. He continued to sip his tea, his eyes fixated on the garden out the window. “I know,” he said flatly, resisting the involuntary urge to sigh.

Shax continued to nitpick over details of the diagrams copied over from the imps summoned outside of Loudwater. “The plan has minimal chances of success.”

“That’s correct,” Normanir replied in the same flat tone.

“You don’t have enough forces if the monks and nuns at the shrine decide to take up arms. I can only do so much.”

Normanir took another sip of his tea. “That contingency has been accounted for. Take a closer look at the blue sheet.”

“This is amateur,” Shax said, far too quickly to have really analyzed the plans closely.

“Then it seems like you’ll need to pull your considerable weight when we get there.”

Snorting again, Shax gave away the annoyance caused by the retort. “You’re putting the responsibility for success on me, the risk of failure is higher for me, yet the credit for this effort will be given to you.”

Tired of listening to yet another complaint speech after a night of obsessively planning, Normanir didn’t wait before responding. “Are you looking for sympathy?” he asked, finally turning around halfway to look at the hunched over scaly devil. Shax didn’t reply, merely wrinkling its tiny nose and pursing its thin lips like it wanted to respond yet couldn’t find words quite sharp enough. As different as the devil was from his own mortal mind, Normanir only really had Shax to work with, and he’d have to find a way - any way - to motivate the creature to succeed. “Everything is on line the for all involved save the arch devil herself,” he said while setting is tea down and approaching the desk. “All we can do is strive to make this work, to believe that this will work, and to stop at nothing short of our own deaths until it works. Any other action or thought will waste our time, period.”

Embarrassed and humbled by the earlier comment, the scaly devil’s ego grasped for straws. “I’ve lived many lifetimes more than you have, mortal; there’s nothing you can advise me on.”

“Nor would I waste my time trying,” Normanir said while ruffling through the notes he’d taken on their plan of attack. “I’m only redirecting your attention to the start…the beginning, the basic plan. Because you’re right: a lot of time has passed, and we need to finish this. If you want to avoid further demotion, then there’s only one way…and it’s here.” He then pointed to an aerial sketch of the shrine to Torm and its skylight.

Despite the scaly devil’s obvious ire, it still appeared curious and studied the notes and sketch for a moment. “You…want me to enter from the roof?” Shax asked.

Normanir smiled with the same darkness he’d seen from the devils he now worked with. Wary of arousing too much resentment in a being as vindictive as he was, he worked to keep Shax focused on their plan of action rather than the near-futility of it all. “Yes, perhaps the most important role,” the half-elf lied. “I enter through the door…and you enter through the roof. We need to ensure that nobody can get out or in. We wouldn’t want our main targets to miss the show.” When Shax raised a hairless eyebrow, Normanir switched to another page of notes. “We must shatter the faith of the worshippers therein; make heretics of them. The target isn’t the idol we’ll smash or the potential defenders we’ll slay…this is a mission of nuance and guile, not brute force.”

Though such a hellish creature wouldn’t waste time on hope, Shax did briefly gain a wily glint of ambition in its eyes. “That’s the hard part…you want to shatter the faith of devotees in one fell swoop. Your goal requires nuance but your plan involves brute force.”

Humming low and shaking his head, Normanir felt his smile spread sincerely this time; he’d hoped Shax would make such a comment. “Were our plan to truly show them the futility and vanity of their belief system, then yes, this plan would have been obtuse and dull. But we don’t need to actually prove or disprove anything to them; we only need to misrepresent reality enough for them to believe as such. This isn’t brutishness…it’s trickery.” When Shax couldn’t understand Normanir’s intentionally opaque explanation, the devil furrowed its brow ridges in frustration, much to the half-elf’s amusement. “We don’t need to enact a true defeat of their guardians or faith; we only need to fool the fools into thinking we did. This will all be a show,” he said while sweeping his hands across the various pictures of fleeing monks and nuns, burning tapestries, and arrows depicting movement around the shrine. “Their shrine will become our stage; I’m the director, and you’re…the villain.”

Throughout the brief exchange, Shax had remained resentful and skeptical, as well as latently depressed over their unlikely chances of success. With each aspect which Normanir explained, though, he could sense the devil’s hopeless lethargy receding in the wake of renewed, if understated, fervor. Little did Shax know that the show had already begun, and Normanir struggled to conceal his own fear of failure and near-certainty that the plan wouldn’t work out, but he’d fail even more quickly if he couldn’t even convince his underlings that they had a fighting chance.

“Now,” he said, interrupting the subservient devil’s thoughts before they could wander toward the unlikely negative outcome any longer. “Let’s review every step one more time, including our contingency plans…

…we can’t afford to wait any longer…”


	9. Chapter Nine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After nearly a year, the plan comes to (slightly unripe) fruition.

Heart pounding, brow sweating, nerves throbbing, Normanir crouched in the bushes across the dirt road passing in front of the lonely, almost cozy little shrine in the High Forest. After weeks of travel and hours of hiding in the wooded area across from the shrine, the half-elf found himself stricken by anxiety. Even after having murdered his demon-worshipping family, even after having dispatched muggers and thugs during his various forays into urban areas, even after his plunging into the infernal knowledge of the occult, the mission he’d been given by Zariel was a step beyond any heinous act he’d committed previously. Armed, rested, and as prepared as he could have been, he still found himself unable to initiate the mission which served as his only source of salvation (or damnation, depending on how one looked at it). Only the gentle tug at his sleeves of the various little minions he’d spent time summoning snapped him out of his stupor.

He turned to the side, finding one of the ugly little hellions as well as two of the flock of imps creeping up next to him. If they noticed his anxiety, they didn’t give it away. “We’ve established a perimeter around the shrine to Torm, Mr. Chandler,” one of the venomless imps said. “There’s not a witness in sight, and the foolish residents are all engaging in a nighttime worship ritual; everything is set up the way you wanted it.”

“Just according to plan,” Normanir murmured, working to conceal his lingering fear. Yes, things had gone according to plan, but the plan was insane and exceedingly unlikely to succeed. There was, however, no more time to waste and no more resources to be had; he found no reason to delay the inevitable.

On lightly shaky legs, he rose and walked out of the bushes, dragging himself toward the low archway entrance covered only with a humble tarp. The marble building before him, not more than a single floor with a high ceiling, thrummed with the holy energy of goodness. Unseen waves of pretentious penance pulsated from the Pertinent Promise, almost nauseating the diabolical half-elf as he approached. Mustering all his might to avoid the ill feeling, Normanir failed to conceal his presence as he approached the archway, leaving his armor to clink and clank at every step. His fingers trembled as he pulled the tarp aside, revealing a dozen-strong congregation of cloaked humanoids kneeling before an ironically grotesque idol to Torm at the far end of the narrow rectangular hall.

For a few moments, Normanir stood there at the archway, shaking off a string of cold chills in reaction to the holy power flowing through the smooth marble blocks comprising every surface except for the cylindrical pillars supporting the central basin. None of the dozen worshippers lifted their heads to regard the outsider, nauseating Normanir again with their welcoming naïveté. A partially armored and armed wayfarer stood at their door staring at their various motions and movements, yet none of them stirred when he began to walk forward, taking baby steps among the rows of kneeling monks and nuns. Even when he stood in front of their sickening plaster effigy at the far end of the shrine, none of them looked up, pretentiously pretending not to notice the obvious intrusion as if they wanted to show off their extreme sense of monastic piety.

Before another pang of outraged nausea could besiege him, Normanir choked down on his pounding heart and pulled his magic warhammer from his baldric. Gripping the handle of Zariel’s gift with shaking hands, he swallowed a dry lump in anticipation as he half expected an entire room full of strangers backstab him, yet that moment didn’t come. Seconds ticked by like days as he gazed up at the displeasing mini-monument to false humility, feeling as if the inanimate object were taunting him with his own inability to act. His law-abiding nature resisted the mission to destroy property; even if this was a place of good, he’d been raised to publicly adhere to the rules and strictures of society, and this flagrant act of desecration constituted an undeclared act of preemptive war.

In the end, his stupor was broken for the second time by one of the unwitting worshippers. A younger man looked up and noticed the stranger wielding a large hammer in front of the shrine’s idol. “What is it you think you’re doing, friend?” the member of the shrine’s monastic order asked rhetorically.

The futility of such a question when Normanir already had the hammer in his hands irritated the half-elf enough to push him over the edge. Acting before thinking, he raised the hammer above his head as well as the gasps and cries of the monks and nuns who’d looked up. He swung the weight back down, allowing the centripetal force to wreck the plaster statue in a beautiful display of gravitational force. The head of the warhammer cracked open the statue and sank downward until it slammed into the plinth supporting the idol, cracking that marble surface as well. Feet shuffled as the sharp fragments of the idol clacked on the floor, alerting Normanir to the shock and awe of the worshippers behind him. He could already feel the heat of their moral outrage while he hefted his hammer back up and turned away from the shattered results of his evil doing.

All dozen or so worshippers stood up before him, arranged in front of him in rows as they regarding the complete and total stranger who’d wandered into their shrine and assaulted it unprovoked. True to their devotion to Torm, they reacted with righteous anger, pulling back their hoods and jabbing their accusatory fingers at their unknown assailant while their minds struggled to grasp the suddenness and seeming randomness of the long-premeditated act.

“Monster!” hissed one of the nuns.

“Blasphemer!” gasped one of the monks.

“How dare you!” said the first nun in an increasingly loud voice.

“Who do you think you are?” asked another.

“What gives you the right!” shrieked a monk in a shrill voice.

All at once, the dozen or so pious pretenders yelled into a single cacophony of condemnation, barely restraining their hands as they demanded explanations for the offensive act. The paler-skinned among them reddened, the heavier among them perspired, and all of them strained their faces as they grappled with the unexpected and incomprehensible assault by a stranger. All of them were focused on the offending stranger, all of them directing the entirety of their attention in a blazing cone of righteous fury. Their behavior wasn’t what caused Normanir to pause for a third time, however.

What gave him pause were their backgrounds. As they all stood and revealed themselves, he begin to realize why they’d chosen the High Forest to construct their lonely, remote shrine. Slightly pointed ears and almond shaped eyes flashed at him in the commotion of gnashing teeth and jabbing, accusatory fingers. Traces of wood elven heritage marked the group of mixed-race people just at it marked Normanir himself, and the human features they bore reminded him of his Chondathan ancestors. In fact, the rancor they caused as they all shouted over each other, the disorganized ruckus raised when they all tried to berate him at once, reminded him far too much of his own family.

Unable to discern what any of them were saying, he became increasingly irritated, especially when another young man close to his age reached forward and tried to grab his hammer. “Put that down, stranger, and submit yourself to arrest!” the other seemingly half-elven man yelled right in Normanir’s face, hurting his ears.

One of the nuns attempted to grab him by the arm. “We’re going to cure you of your wickedness!” the holy woman screeched, though her words sounded more like a threat than a promise of redemption.

Beset by voices and hands who reminded him all too much of his overbearing family members who he’d sacrificed, Normanir felt his patience wear a little too thin. Eager to forcibly suppress the chaotic behavior surrounding him, he yanked his hammer away from the monk and made a profane hand signal which could be sensed beyond the shrine’s walls. “Hold them!” he yelled, raising his voice above those of his hostile interlocutors.

At once, the minions he’d been granted responded to his infernal call. Stained glass windows shattered as the little Hellions pelted them with rocks, allowing the flock of imps to fly inside. The tiny devils set upon the worshippers as planned, pulling at their clothes and hair in an effort to frighten rather than actually harm them. The Hellions soon followed, climbing over the window sills and running amok inside the shrine, tearing down tapestries and knocking over bowls of offerings and incense. The tiny and small devils all did their best to harass the monks and nuns, jumping around and creating an absolute mess of the place to scare the good-hearted mortals away.

Unfortunately for Normanir, he’d underestimated the resolve of Torm’s devotees.

“Back foul creature!” one of the nuns shouted as she grabbed a silver goblet from a table and swung out with it.

The drinking vessel struck one of the Hellions in the temple, immediately killing the child-sized devil before its corpse even hit the ground. Though the other one was too stupid to feel afraid, the flock of imps slowed in its petty harassment, gazing uneasily at their dead comrade. Even when the dead Hellion’s corpse disintegrated into flammable dust which slowly ignited the cloths covering the tables against one wall of the shrine, the worshippers reacted with all the fury of judgmental commoners whose sensibilities had been offended.

Reacting swiftly if not effectively, the cloaked worshippers grabbed the unprepared imps, horse whipping the tiny devils on the floor and against the columns holding up the ceiling. The second Hellion was killed during the fray, though Normanir couldn’t see how - he only heard the ashy poof and saw a carpet ignite. Anxiety gripped him again as he realized his plan to shatter the faith of the devotees through fear was failing. “Shax!” he yelled, calling on the truant dragon-devil.

Another crash, much louder than that of the first windows, echoed off the marble walls as the skylight was shattered. The gargoyle-like fiend leapt to the floor in the center of the shrine, unfurling its wings in a threatening display. Shax, however, proved to be the least lucky of the devils that night.

“I cast thee out!” the monk who’d previously accosted Normanir yelled while running to the alter and grabbing a sizable bowl of holy water.

In one fluid motion, the monk hurled the entire bowl at Shax, splashing the entire volume of the holy water onto the unsuspecting devil’s face. Acidic smoke immediately erupted from the affected areas, hissing alongside the devilish cry as Shax clutched its face. The attack had been picture perfect, pouring the holy water on every square inch from the scaly devil’s forehead to the bottom of its jaw. Doubling over in agony, Shax was entirely unprepared for the blessed silver axe which had been held in the hands of the plaster idol. Before Normanir could intervene, the monk slammed the holy weapon into the scaly devil’s throat, cutting open the softest flesh of its body and searing into the meat with a holy blade. Gagging as it bled out and its face melted at the same time, the imposing black Abishai fell prone as it was laid to waste by an inexperienced shrine tender with no combat experience. Normanir stood frozen not in fear, but rather utter confusion at how such a challenging foe as an Abishai could have been killed in seconds by a civilian.

As Shax bled out, its ichor desecrated the marble floor, eating away half an inch of the surface and staining the marble with an unnaturally writhing layer of warped infernal compound. The imps, as they were killed, exploded into clouds of venom which covered the faces and hands of the worshippers. Rather than killing them, the venom inflamed their skin and eyes, causing them to scream as the foul substance induced hallucinations of their false god burning in hell. The Hellion ash had spread to all the tapestries, table cloths, and carpets, burning down the interior of the glass-strewn shrine. Everything had occurred in less than fifteen seconds, leaving Normanir far behind the events as they occurred but also granting him ample time to observe and choose his next course of action.

Stepping over Shax, Normanir hefted his warhammer as he approached the monk who’d slain the Abishai so quickly. “You’ll be the example,” he told his fellow half-elf youth, ensuring that they looked each other in the eyes first.

After the initial wave of panic one would naturally experience when facing down a hostile stranger, the young monk squared his shoulders and refused to back down, grabbing an iron candlestick and waving is threateningly. “Torm, aid me!” the monk yelled valiantly, temporarily drawing the attention of the monks and nuns who weren’t yet entirely blinded by the imp ichor.

Although Normanir wasn’t as familiar with a hammer as he was with a sword, he knew enough, and he used the head of the weapon to twist the candlestick out of the monk’s hands in seconds. Not to be cowed into silence, the monk threw himself at Normanir, crying out in protest until a quick thrust from the top of the hammer took the wind out of him. The monk fell to his knees, granting Normanir enough time to grab the man by the hair and toss him in front of the groaning and agonizing worshippers. Rather than ending the man’s life right there in front of him, Normanir dragged out the suffering in the most humiliating way he could imagine.

He raised the warhammer above his head. “Where is your god now?” he asked acidically right as he brought the weapon down in between the monk’s legs, crushing the man’s groin.

The monk screamed in a high pitched tone until he lost his voice, twisting and writhing in agony. As if on cue, Shax let out a death groan, gurgling until its throat and upper chest spontaneously combusted. Popping open like a beached whale exploding, a rush of noxious gas and Abishai ichor splashed outwards. Unlike the remains of the imps, the blood of Shax wasn’t venomous; unlike the remains of the Hellions, its remains weren’t flammable. The loud pop as a portion of its body burst open, however, was the straw which broke the camel’s back.

“Noooo!” one of the other monk’s screamed, running into a flaming tapestry as he blindly tried to flee.

“Torm, why have you forsaken us!” one of the nuns cried and spat as she tried to scratch the imp venom from her tongue.

Playing the role of villain as best he could, Normanir chased the rest of the worshippers out, kicking aside debris and feigning attacks with his hammer. “Did you not see that I struck down your idol!” Normanir yelled after them from the doorway. He watched all of them, all eleven of them, flee into the woods in three separate groups - hopefully to different villages and trading posts whereby they could spread the word of his heinous act.

His heart pounding like it had been when he’d first smashed the statue less than three minutes ago, Normanir turned away from the archway to survey the havoc he’d wrought. The carpets and tapestries had already burned out, leaving only small fires on the warped floor. Overturned tables and fruit bowls stained by venom were strewn about, along with the shards of stained glass and plaster idol peppering the floor. A truly evil, devilish scene laid before him, and even if the execution had been amateur and resulted in the deaths of his assigned minions, it was his executed plan.

The renewed groans from the crippled monk on the floor reminded him, however, that there still remained one more step.


	10. Chapter Ten

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And so it ends with an oath and a pact.

Glass shards crunched beneath Normanir’s boots as he continued sweeping away debris from the center of the shrine’s floor. His work was rushed and inexact, much sloppier than was his habit, but his heart rate wouldn’t slow down due to anticipation of what came next. Now that the fires had stopped burning, the devil corpses had melted into sludge, and the worshippers had fled far off into the night, the only sound remaining was the soft weeping of the lone monk who’d attempted to fight him. Once the floor had been cleared off, that shattered devotee became the center of attention.

Normanir grabbed the man by the hair again, causing him to clutch his wounded groin and curl into a ball. In the center of the shrine, the monk was laid out like a sacrificial lamb. Removing his helmet and pulling out a fine dagger, Normanir knelt down and drew a cut wide enough to provide a sufficient pool of blood. Ignoring the gasps of the broken monk, the half-elf heretic used the dagger to draw a pentagram on the floor, along with infernal runes which Shax had taught him over the previous months.

Unlike the first time, the calling circle this time didn’t require much time to function. Within minutes of his invocation, the edges of the circle burned into the floor, opening up a portal to hell granting a brief glimpse of the first layer. There were a few moments in which Normanir quietly watched the ravaged landscape of Avernus flickered, burning in an odd, inconsistent time-warped image. After an unclear number of minutes later, unseen wings flapped from the other side, prompting Normanir to immediately kneel in anticipation.

The temperature in the Pertinent Promise noticeably increased as the arch devil herself rose through the circle, bathing the darkened shrine in light and shadows from her fiery halo. Zariel didn’t look anywhere other than her charge, staring down at Normanir with an expression of reserved disbelief which puzzled him.

“I’ve completed the task, archduchess Zariel,” he said, maintaining a lowered gaze while he knelt. He could sense her displeasure, however, and worried that she might be upset about the dead minions. “The…others lost their material bodies on this plane while assisting in the mission, but their rebirth in hell will-“

“They fulfilled their purposes,” Zariel replied, interrupting him and then staring him down again.

Confused as to what she wanted, he continued to speak. “Yes, they served the cause of the Nine Hells well. As I’m sure you saw, the shrine has been desecrated, and the sacrifice of this one worshipper has allowed me to both call upon you, and to shatter the faith of the others. I’ve done my best to provide this humble service to you.”

Her stone-faced expression broke only slightly to allow her dismissive disappointment to burn through, outright scaring him. Her lips tightened as she silently judged him. “This wasn’t how things were supposed to turn out,” she said in a flat tone.

Desperate for her approval, Normanir arched his neck to look up at her deferentially. “Tell me what else must be done, archduchess!” he asked.

Maintaining her cold stare for a few moments more, her somber disappointment showed and betrayed a very personal sense of lost hope. “You were supposed to die,” she replied.

At first, her comment didn’t quite register. He wondered if there was a hidden meaning, or a metaphorical intention behind her words. When the reality dawned on him, however, he was gripped by fear again in spite of her relaxed posture. “I…um…come again?”

Hands folded behind her back, she shook her head and took a step to the side. “Everyone involved here had to be tested. The flock of imps you summoned had neared demotion; their suicide mission was to prove their lack of faltering when faced with a painful outcome. Shax had grown tired of Tiamat’s unlawful nature; his outward appearance of failure will have him demoted out of her ranks, whereby I can promote him to a more useful form. The Hellions…well, there is no category of devils called Hellions. You made that up during our concluded deal, and those former nupperiboes will now be granted the opportunity for promotion which they’d been previously denied.”

Turning her head over her shoulder to look back at him, she spoke quietly and without anger, as if her words were a matter of fact. “And you…you were supposed to die and fail to uphold your end of the bargain, granting me another lemure to fill the ranks of canon fodder. You failed to fail.”

As much as her words hurt, much more than the rejection of his family ever had, he saw the strategy behind her ideas. His mind couldn’t accept that his promises in the bargain had meant so little in her plans, though. “But…archduchess, I’ve offered you so much more than what a lemure can do. I’ve fulfilled a lifelong contract which wasn’t supposed to conclude yet!”

“You’re wrong,” she replied, using a tone of finality which felt like a punch in the gut. With a flick of the wrist on her non-prosthetic hand, she conjured the contract they’d signed. The vellum floated above her open palm, rotating slowly as words which he didn’t recall seeing when he’d signed the document shined on the back. “You closely read the fine print on the front page - far more closely than my other mortal servants, for far more time than I wanted to spend in your presence. If only you’d checked the back of the document, you would have noticed more clauses which you’d signed on for.”

As diabolical as her revelation to him was, such behavior was the reason why he’d so desperately sought her acceptance of his services in the first place. “May I, my lady?” he asked while bowing his head again.

Sighing as if she were bored already, she flicked the contract from her hand, causing it to float over to him. “You may read any document you signed; you may not call me ‘my lady’ ever again.”

“I’m sorry, archduchess.” He then spent a few moments reading the clauses which he hadn’t known of previously. “Wait a minute…our agreement on the front said I’d enter hell and skip the lemure phase of development if I fulfilled my end of the bargain, but here it says that the contract is marked as complete and…no longer binding…wait, no longer binding once the mission is complete?”

“Thus rendering the clause about your post-mortem plans irrelevant,” she said, finishing the idea for him. “As I said, you were supposed to die; I need foot soldiers in the ranks of canon fodder. I never expected you to actually succeed in this, thus I was willing to accept whatever stipulations you requested on the front page. And now…for the second time…” She turned her whole body back toward him, facing him head on. “…your behavior has surprised me while still remaining lawful. Admirable, but…our deal has still concluded,” she explained, her voice joyless and disinterested. “We’re done.”

Barely concealed panic pushed him to scoot forward on his knee, though a modicum of dignity remained in his psyche and prevented him from actually begging. “What kind of test is this currently, then?” he asked, attempting to drag out the conversation.

“It isn’t,” she said with the same tone of finality.

“An arch devil is rejecting a mortal’s request for a deal? Or am I to contact one of your rivals?”

His words irritated her slightly, though her slight irritation touched him with true terror for the first time. He shrank away slightly when she remained in her place and glared at him. Her response didn’t require much time to prepare, though. “You’re not as smart as you think, but you’re at least smart enough to know better than to issue threats. I grew tired of your delusions of grandeur the first time we met; say what you’re implying immediately.”

Fearful of her ire but delighted that she was entertaining his plea, he cleared his throat and looked back up at her. “Archduchess…I could whisper a wish out loud right now, based on the spilled blood of a good heart, and your peers and even subordinates would answer me. Most mortals only request power in exchange for their souls; I’m offering you my fealty! You know that your peers would ignore a hundred pleas for regretful bargains for a willing oath of fealty. What have I done wrong in this mission that has earned your rejection?”

“First of all,” she said without skipping a beat, “you were so eager, so desperate, that you didn’t even question the nature of the mission. You claim that you wish to aid the armies of the Nine Hells to stop the spread of the Abyss, yet you accepted this quest to assault a lawful good deity’s shrine without question. Torm and his devotees have no connection at all to the Abyss, or to demons, or to the chaotic corruption you witnessed in your family, yet you didn’t ask a single time how this mission connected to your stated reasons for contacting me whatsoever.”

Eager and, as she said, perhaps a little desperate, he didn’t wait before answering her right back either, so scared was he of their working relationship being cut. “Because a loyal soldier doesn’t question orders! Archduchess, do you not see the value in a subordinate who isn’t simply searching for a means to overthrow you?”

Without even responding, she looked away from him and back to the portal. “I seek and am not sought,” she said, switching the topic entirely. “I choose the most valiant warriors to fill the ranks of my hell knights, whereas you’re nothing more than a hellhound pup with minimal combat experience. Your claim to achievement was murdering your grandparents with a shovel.”

“And destroying the shrine of a lawful good deity, in the middle of a forest far from my home, after months of research unassisted!” he said urgently, speaking more quickly than his usual subdued rhythm. “You gave me a quest which you didn’t expect me to fulfill, and I’ve exceeded your expectations! Archduchess, what more do you want?”

“Nothing,” she replied, waving a limp wrist at him dismissively. “We’re done. You already have your answer. My rank and file have no place for over-eager supplicants.”

“Weren’t you over-eager when you took the fight against chaos down to the lower planes?”

Immediately after blurting out his final retort, he shut his eyes and bowed his head, expecting a painful death. This time, it was her turn to stand stupefied for a moment, coping with disbelief at what she’d just heard. Cursing himself for his foolishness, he hoped that she’d at least raise him as a lemure rather than a nupperibo. Her wrath, however, didn’t descend upon him.

Slowly, she took a few steps toward him, leaving him kneeling in front of her. She made no effort to raise him up and seemed content to leave him at her feet for a few moments while she considered what to do with him. Even though devil’s needed very little oxygen to survive, he could still hear her take a deep breath while judging his fate. Her previous irritable demeanor had disappeared, however, and he could sense - from her stillness as well as the length of her pause - that she was hatching a plot other than mere punishment.

After a few of the scariest seconds of his life, she finally spoke. “Stop kneeling; you’re not my soldier…yet.”

Hope was immediate, and he felt as if a vice clamping on his lungs had suddenly released him. Deferent if still over-eager, he stood, averting his eyes until he felt her precariously patient gaze upon him. He looked up to see her stone-faced expression had receded, if not actually softened, and his creeping fear gradually subsided like ooze flowing away from an open flame.

She reached out and gripped his shoulder with her non-prosthetic hand. There was nothing sisterly about the act of physical contact; her touch was rough and obtuse, and her firm grip seemed more like the last-chance warning of a negotiator than the consolation of a mentor. “You think you want to follow my footsteps?” she asked rhetorically, lacing her tone with a faint trace of skepticism.

Relieved that he’d persuaded her not to give up on their bargain yet, he sighed first and caught his breath before answering. “Archduchess Zariel…I contacted you after I’d ended my family, and only you, because of what I’d read about you in their tomes.” He stopped and silently nodded his head to her while swallowing the last lump of anxiety down his throat. “This is what I want.”

Still skeptical, she tilted her head whole regarding him. She was obviously planning something, perhaps the ways in which she could worsen his situation if he ever stepped out of line, but he clung to the consolation that she was at least considering his wish. If she didn’t intend to strike a deal, then she would have already left.

“You say that now…you may not feel the same when the time comes for fulfill your end of such a bargain. But, I’ll accept your fealty - your eternal, undying fealty. I’ll offer you an oath and a pact in return. I’ll even allow you to be reborn above the rank of a lemure and skip that phase entirely. But now that you’ve made these claims…these very bold, foolish claims…then I mandate new terms and conditions for a new contract.”

“My undying loyalty is yours, archduchess!” he replied in relief, finally allowing his brow to arch and reveal that he truly was desperate.

Her eyes narrowed at him. “You say that now…we’ll see. This time, I won’t mince words, and there’s no reason to rush. In fact, I can tell you the terms and conditions which you must accept right here, right now. If you reject them, then you can walk away unharmed, keep that hammer, and never deal with the Nine Hells again.” Preventing him from talking any further, she pulled him forward and leaned in close until they were aligned ear-to-ear.

Even though there weren’t any witnesses or eavesdroppers, she spoke to him in a quiet, low tone. Her words were pronounced slowly and chosen carefully, as if every utterance from her mouth bore the utmost importance. She said comparatively little because her conservative speech carried deep meanings using few statements, though the trickery and guile which typified devils were absent from her offer. She told him everything she’d expect from him, everything she demanded, and exactly what his fate would be if he accepted.

Only when she’d reached the end of what a bargain would entail did she cease speaking, granting him a few bewildered seconds to fully grasp what she’d said. He had, of course, because of the clarity and precise wording she’d used. The gravity of the offer weighed heavily on him, and she didn’t browbeat or pressure him into finishing the discussion early.

When he’d considered all she’d said, he felt a certain numbness tingling in his toes, and he stared into her molten eyes while coming to terms with what she’d asked of him. “This is…much more serious that what you’d tasked me with before,” he said, unable to feel or even know how he felt about all the steps he’d taken in his life over the previous year.

She nodded silently, as he’d done before. “It is. Your burden will weigh much more. The reward you’ll reap, however, is far greater than what’s you’d previously asked for. If you want to fight in my name, then you must accept all or nothing.”

Although she’d offered him the opportunity to walk away, the iron grip with which she squeezed his shoulder implied that the time had come to choose. “I have to know that you still want this in order for the deal to be sealed, Normanir,” she said, actually using his name for the first time.

Her question was apt, for the gravity of their new, lifelong deal possessed a powerful pull. He even hesitated for a moment and asked himself what his life would be like if he walked away at that moment. The answer to that question, more than anything else, was what drove him to accept.

Sighing through his nose, he released any reservations he’d still held on to. “I wouldn’t have this any other way,” he said.

For the first time since he’d met her, Zariel gave another expression, one lacking in the hardness he’d come to expect from her. Though she didn’t quite smile, she neither scowled nor started at him blankly, and he felt like she was giving him the closest she ever got to a smile. “Then this was only the beginning…”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> How’s that for an origin story? This is a character which I’ll probably use more for stories than for actual adventures and dungeon crawls, though time will tell as to how this will turn out.


End file.
